[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

I was finally able to watch a live class in real time! And we went out and tried the first 2 games during class. Then I had to get the tunnel moved for mowing 🙂

Here’s Winging it with FC and Spin. She gives me pretty good commitment to the wing.

Then we tried the beginning steps of game 2 with the tight blind crosses and adding in the FC to tunnel. Trying to keep my wings down. LOL

Fun games! Lots to do with this configuration.

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi!

Glad you said this because I had no idea how I was going to pull that off!: No need to do the FC on this one, it won’t make sense with her speed 🙂 It would only be a good exercise in why the BC is a much better choice LOL!!!

I revisited the BC to teh tunnel. It felt a bit better, but then I saw the video and I was still kind of running the arc, not getting out of there. But, I was farther ahead, just need to adjust my line. It was much easier for us on the first side – not sure if it’s because I’m right handed or not.

Then I tried the Rear Cross set up and it was hard for me. I tried breaking it down some and that helped.

Thanks,

Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

Back from our little break.

I’ll revisit those wraps. I wanted to try some of the other exercises. It was gross and hot, so we kept it short.

Here’s the start of the Fluffy BC (I will do the FC separately):

While in blind cross mode, I wanted to try the next game with the send and BC to tunnel. Dellin sends out fine, my timing seemed a bit late when looking at the video. Maybe I went too deep in there(?) or I could actually run faster. LOL. You see this configuration (or variations) all the time, so it’s great that she will have the exposure to it so early on.

Looking forward to getting back to it!

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Thanks for the extra videos!

My timing must have been really bad – the “jump” was instead of a go, but I probably did not need to say much at that jump – it was right in front of her. I meant the left/right was where she was going after after that jump.

I think maybe I need to spread my set up out more. I felt like everything was way too close and I had no time to get the words out.

Dellin has several markers for toys – and when I train agility I seem to forget to use ANY of them ALL the time. I can also try leaving it out on the ground.

I tried to do some wraps this morning and it was a mixed bag. Again, the spacing seemed too small. I know what this fells like when I run Mari – the decel and the turn, but I felt like I was thinking too hard and it was really messing things up. I usually cue the wraps with Mari with my back to the jump – it’s more comfortable for me (what I’m used to). Trying to do the front cross leaves me facing the wrong way too long since I’m not turning quickly enough and leaving (I’m facing the tunnel too long).

I had to back up and work on 1 and 2 jumps. We did manage a couple of reps with more, but overall not the best session.

We are camping now for a few days, so I will rebuild the set up when I get home again and maybe give myself a little more space. I’m not exactly sure how big it was, but once I was trying to cue a wrap, there was not enough room for me to feel comfortable.

And I still was not using any toy marker and bars were falling all over the place. We need to regroup – she used to be able to turn tight. And I need to stop overthinking it!

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

Thanks for the clarification. Big emotional response was like an understatement – she had a meltdown which was hard to see. I understand how to proceed. Will get some video just to make sure I’m on the right track. I don’t know that she will try very hard to find the cookie in the grass. The only thing she likes to look for in the grass is rabbit poo and I draw the line on using that as a treat. Actually, if I handed it to her or suggested that she eat it, she’d probably never eat it again. LOL

Watched the first part of Saturday’s class and worked on the lazy game – send to the jump and lazy game to tunnel, the added some movement. Lots of bars coming down in conjunction with throwing the toy, so looking for ideas to clean that up.

Thanks,

Joan

[agilitywawa]

It was like giving her a cookie and then cuing the frisbee toss. Just giving her the idea like teaching them a clicker. I was literally asking for nothing!

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

I started trying to work with treats and she had a pretty aversive reaction. I was basically trying to give her a treat and then mark and throw her frisbee. She did not want to take the treats, but she did reluctantly, then she would not chase her frisbees and she completely shut down (went what I call “floppy fish” – meaning she flopped down on the ground and would not move, so she was pretty uncomfortable. Usually when I get out the frisbees, I can get her out of those bad places, but today it’s like she was suspicious of the whole thing.

If I lose the toys, I will have nothing.

I know I have told you that she is sensitive, but she is on the abnormal/unusual end of the spectrum, so I need to be careful. I worked with someone else just on the training a sensitive dog piece and I don’t want to hijack this thread with someone else’s comments, but I’s be happy to share them with you privately if that would help you.

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

I think now I finally had the right idea for Winging it. On the one side, she cut behind me a couple of times on the way back to the tunnel. Was my connection not good? I did forget to use her wrap verbals on the middle wing – I was overthinking the rest of it I guess.

Then we did a little with the teeter – first with a hollee roller. She would target it, but I still had to throw it. The I switched to the pepperoni. First one was on the end of the plank and she stopped and ate it. Then I threw the frisbee. Second rep, I tried putting the pepperoni on the table, but that did not work, so I returned to the end of the plank. She seemed to like it, which means nothing – she could spit it out tomorrow, but for today it was a win.

In the past I worked on trying to reinforce the eating with the toy, so it’s not unfamiliar. I just never got her to the point where she was really excited about the food. At least this morning she did actually swallow the pepperoni before I threw the frisbee.

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

On the winging it, I TOTALLY misunderstood what I was supposed to do with the middle wing! Now that I understand, I will redo it.

Dellin did her first disc event today, so I think that’s enough work (she probably disagrees). You’d be happy to know that in the “frizgility” game where they do a 3 jump arc, then catch the disc, Dellin did not need any direction on the jumps – I think that qualifies as my Lazy Game for today since I was not really moving 🙂 and I was not close to those jumps either.

Teeter – I can use other toys, she will target them too.

The food remains tough. She does not really have any favorites. She will eat string cheese at her classes, but generally not at home. Hotdogs don’t work. Sometimes I can steal some grilled chicken from Terry and she will take that most of the time, but if she sees it more than once or twice in close proximity, then it loses it’s attraction. I bought a few slices of pepperoni today to try out with her. Usually my dogs love deli meats, but Dellin is harder – it has been a long time since I’ve tried these kinds of meats. As ridiculous as it sounds, she likes Zukes type treats more than most things. I have some freeze dried stuff that she has not seen in a while, so that might work. Everything is pretty short lived in terms of keeping her interest. She takes treats better at class than at home – I think because her arousal is up and sometimes it’s like she’s redirecting on to the treats and will get a little chompy (she otherwise takes treats very gently).

I can continue to try other things. I thought she was liking watermelon – I was handing it out to everyone yesterday and she eagerly eats when everyone is getting treats. Today by herself I gave her a piece of watermelon and she took it, spit it out, studied it and then ate it. So there’s no speed to the eating. She eats her meals well, but I think that is helped by context – everyone else is super pumped and eating fast. I prefer not to use her meals for training because it took a long time to get her to eat her meals at mealtime and we are in a good place with that (they are also raw and messy).

She also tends to like crunchy treats, so not the best for training, but if she actually likes them, then maybe I should revisit that. Or maybe she’s just taking them because the other dogs are!

I will work on the food rewards with the plank. Would I still throw the cookie or hand it to her and then throw a toy?

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

I was trying to implement your suggestions for Winging it, but I must have been doing something wrong – we seemed to have some struggle – so my movement must not be correct. The first 2 felt pretty good, but I was not sure if it was too much like yesterday’s reps. One way was easier (for me anyway). I left in the ones where we did not get the middle wing so you could see.

Teeter – same set up but letting her drive ahead to the frisbee at the end.

Then some plank games – raised the plank a little, used “search” to find the cookies and did some turning around. She was like, why are you trying to stop me – I walk now. And must I eat this cookie? A little judgey. The space is pretty small, so I can see why she’s not running – nowhere to go. The plank weighs a ton, so taking it outside is a pain, but I can do it. Or take a plank off the dog walk to use.

Thanks,

Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

As it was BC yesterday (before coffee), I did not even realize I had done the spin until I looked at the video again. Out early this morning again, but had one cup of coffee beforehand! I added on to the Winging It using that center wing. I was trying to focus on turning my shoulders to get that tight turn and only taking the one step to send. I knew she could handle it after seeing her get that one jump send on Sunday going to the serp at the seminar.

Thanks for setting me back on the path with the teeter. I changed the set up this morning and we just worked on going up. I think having the table the remakes so much more sense for her than the plank to nowhere. There’s a tiny bit of give on the plank – I had to find props that were the correct size and brace the yoga mats under the one end.

Then we moved on to the lazy game. I know she just wanted to blast around and do the 3 jumps and was looking at me like why are you not running? You always run. A little judgey, but we are not the type that meander 🙂 I was not sure if you were looking for a slower type of movement. I was saying “toss” (hard to hear) which is her marker that means I’m throwing the toy/friz right to you at close range. In the time off between sessions 2 & 3, we did some bend grids, so she knew that shape meant go take them all, but I was not acting quite right.

Tonight in the nice cold basement, we did the first 2 baby steps of plank confidence. And for Dellin, this is about as much enthusiasm for cookies as you will ever get. It looked pretty normal. Edited out some chewing time, but she did have ones where she was right back. I knew if I did this outside, the likelihood of her looking for cookies in the grass is about zero (and then my Lab would spend her entire training time doing nothing but finding them). Tradeoff was the bouncing on the mats. I realize I was quiet – I was not sure what to say, so just shut up and let her chase the cookies.

Off topic and not part of class, but thanks – we now have a 12 pole wide open channel on the weaves.

Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

Hope you had a safe trip back to the South from what I now call the Sub-Saharan Tundra! Great to see you this weekend – we had so much fun and learned a ton! Very proud of the baby dog at her first seminar 🙂

We got out early am for baby steps on the Wing send. I think a couple of times I used the wrong wrap cue (this was pre-coffee).

Then I wanted to show you where we are at with the teeter. I had bought the Independent Study class and the first game I did was the Mountain Climber and she had a bad reaction. She did it once and then basically would not get on the plank again and quit – just laid down and would not come near it. She would still bang the end and hop on to the end position.
And she won’t eat cookies when she’s worried (or when she’s not worried, lol), so no amount of cookies at the end of that teeter was going to help.

At that point for the up, I went back to the plank in the basement. I had to start with it flat – any elevation made her instantly suspicious. Then we gradually tilted it up – on a Cato board, then 2 Catos, then something a little higher, finally working up to a 16″ table and she was happily running up and down.

I kind of abandoned the Mountain climbers after all that rehab since I knew class was going to have some teeter games. The video shows where we are at. She will work for her frisbees and she’s bringing them back and offering getting on. So I’ve been letting her do this back and forth to get comfortable since it had many elements present – the banging, some up and some down.
But now I feel like I need to get back to a plan. Some sessions, we’d just do 1 rep per some of your lectures on the effectiveness of one rep and then play frisbee. Now she’s more comfortable and it’s her choice to offer the behavior, not me asking. It’s not strictly a one rep to one frisbee toss either- I mix it up so sometimes there are a couple of frisbee throws. And I’m really trying o be mindful of not coercing her to do it and letting her opt in.

I tried to replace the 16″ table with a 24″ table and that was a bit too much. I think we can progress a little from the 16″ table, but I need a more gradual progression.

Thanks,
Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi Tracy,

I think it was 40 last week, now 80 and a tornado watch, so train agility! Being from the East coast, I don’t know if the watch is the bad one. LOL. We survived.

Back to the lap turns since it’s out of my comfort zone. Left in the boo boos from that first side with one wing.

When I went to 2 wings, I tried to do less running backwards! She has some serious wide outruns around those wings which is unusual for her – was my arm flinging all over??

Question on Max Pup 3 – I saw you posted that it was full. I have not signed up yet – I wanted to do basically what I’m doing now as the live dates mostly don’t work for me- so I’d watch those on video and then post my video for you. Is that still available?

Thanks!

Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi,

Thanks for that – on the serp, I could definitely see the problem especially with the toy in arm in the serp hand.

Today we did the baby steps of the Lap Turns – one wing, then 2. She did not have many mistakes and I could see that I was crowding the jump when it did happen.

Then we revisited the lateral lead out. I did a couple of refresher reps to start with just the wing. Then we used 2 jumps. She did really well, so I tried the next step of me moving towards the middle of the bar. She did well on those too.

My issue was trying to keep straight which arm I was supposed to use (I did watch the video again and then I get outside and can’t remember anything). I think some of my problem was the toy and trying to hold it in my throwing hand. When I did the throwback at the end, the hands made more sense…

Thanks,

Joan

[agilitywawa]

Hi!

UGH, Sorry- here’s both sides of the serp dialed way back. I have a tendency to get stuck in training and not make things harder, so here was the one time I moved too fast. Redo on both sides:

We also got back to the Get Out -bar on ground is 10′ from jump. I started a little closer and tried to stay out.

We tried the lap turns this morning too in the basement which went well. We’ll try them outside tomorrow.

Thanks,
Joan

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